Cannot create vSAN ESA cluster - Error seen: "vSphere lifecycle manager (vLCM) configuration".

Products

• VMware vSAN

Issue/Introduction

• When trying to create a vSAN ESA cluster on vCenter by selecting the Cluster in the inventory > Configure > vSAN > Services, selecting the desired vSAN configuration and clicking "Configure", when the wizard is opened, the option "vSAN ESA" is greyed out and the messages shown below are seen:
  • "Based on the prechecks your hardware compatibility or cluster configuration is not eligible for vSAN ESA".
  • In the "Compatibility checks", it's seen:
    • "vSphere lifecycle manager (vLCM) configuration" - "vLCM is the only supported lifecycle management protocol for vSAN ESA, which replaces VUM(vSphere Update Manager)".

Environment

VMware vSAN 8.x

Cause

• vLCM is the mandatory prerequisite for enabling/creating the vSAN ESA Cluster from vCenter.
• vLCM is the only supported lifecycle management protocol for vSAN ESA.

Resolution

1. Migrate to vSphere Lifecycle Manager (vLCM), enabling vLCM per cluster and configure a cluster image.
   
   

To proceed with this migration, please follow the instructions on the "Configure vLCM" section of Introducing vSphere Lifecycle Management (vLCM).

Additional Information

Possible Impact:

• Clusters managed by SDDC Manager should NOT be transitioned from vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines (VUM) to vSphere Lifecycle Manager Images (vLCM) directly via vCenter UI / APIs.
• If a user wants a vLCM cluster, either create a new vLCM based Workload Domain and create a vLCM cluster or create a new cluster in already existing vLCM based Workload Domain from SDDC Manager.
• Reference: Transition from vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines to vSphere Lifecycle Manager Images is not supported with VMware Cloud Foundation.
• Multi-NSX configuration which is not compatible with vLCM. Reference: Multi-NSX Support For a single Compute Manager (vCenter)